Nifty volatile after initial surge; ONGC, L&T, Sterlite dip

The benchmark Nifty bounced back with 35 points gain in early trade after seeing a fall of 67 points on Wednesday. But that could not sustain for long; indices immediately erased those gains and turned volatile.

At 9:17 hours IST, Tata Steel, Hindalco, Sesa Goa, SAIL, Bharti Airtel, L&T, Jaiprakash Associates, Tata Motors, Axis Bank, Kotak Mahindra Bank, ICICI Bank, Reliance Capital, Sun Pharma, HCL Tech and Infosys were on buyers' radar.

However, NTPC, Tata Power and ONGC were witnessing selling pressure.

At 9:17 hours IST, the 30-share BSE Sensex was trading at 20,378, up 77 points and the 50-share NSE Nifty rose 24 points to 6,103.

About 538 shares advanced as against 189 shares declined on National Stock Exchange. The CNX Midcap went up 38 points to 8,828 and the Nifty Junior gained 66 points at 12,127.

Chambal Fertiliser, RCF, Nagarjuna Fertiliser and Mangalore Chemical were down 2-2.6% as fertiliser secretary said there was no change on urea policy as of now. "GoM will decide urea policy based on recommendations of committee," he said. Finance Ministry sources said urea price decontrol may take place only next fiscal.

Inox gained 7% while Fame India lost 5% on profit booking.

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Global cues

Asian markets were mixed in trade. Shanghai was down 0.45% while Nikkei rose 1.17% and Straits Times was up 0.46%.

The US markets gained marginally on back of strong economic data; dollar index rose 1%.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average ended up 32 points at 11723. The Nasdaq Composite rose 21 points at 2702 and S&P 500 index went up 6 points at 1276.

Commodities

February crude oil contract was up 1% at USD 90.3/barrel

February natural gas contract fell 4% at USD 4.47 per MMBtu

February gold contract ended down 0.4% at USD 1375.8/ounce

March silver contract was down 1.6% at USD 28.93/ounce

Grains rose 2.4% and Nickel was up 1.6%

Baltic Dry Index was down 4.25%

Sugar gained 3.5%

F&O cues:

Total Nifty futures down Rs 300 crore, Options up Rs 3736 crore

Stock futures net add 1.35 cr shares in Open Int

Nifty Fut Open Int net shed 2 lakh shares in Open Int; Nifty futures prem at 24 pts versus 14 pts

Nifty Open Int PCR down at 1.31 from 1.37

Nifty Put add 17.8 lakh shares in Open Int, Call adds 31.6 lakh shares in Open Int

Highest Open Int outstanding shifts to 6200 call (65 lakh) from 6000 Put (61.7 lakh)

Nifty 6200 Call adds 15.4 lakh shares in Open Int

Nifty 6100 Call adds 8.5 lakh shares in Open Int

Nifty 6400 Call adds 6.44 lakh shares in Open Int

Nifty 5800 Put adds 2.2 lakh shares in Open Int

Nifty 6200 Put sheds 3.2 lakh shares in Open Int

Nifty 6100 Put sheds 1.3 lakh shares in Open Int